Hillary Clinton Doesn’t Know When to Stop

It’s hard to dispute that Hillary Clinton is the smartest person in most rooms. That’s why The Times editorial board endorsed her in the Democratic primary in 2008 over Barack Obama.

She just doesn’t know when to hold back, or when to stop. It was her problem when her husband was in the Oval Office. It was her problem in 2008, and it’s her problem now.

In her failed run for the Democratic nomination, Mrs. Clinton’s team cynically introduced race into the campaign, repeatedly. Should the country be more excited about a woman president or a black president? Had African Americans really needed a white leader to achieve their civil rights goals?

The “red phone” ad was a marvel of inappropriateness. It questioned Mr. Obama’s leadership abilities, tried to terrify people about the crisis that would follow his election.

The low point of the 2008 primary season may have been the Pennsylvania election. As we wrote in an editorial at the time, “Mrs. Clinton became the first Democratic candidate to wave the bloody shirt of 9/11. A Clinton television ad — torn right from Karl Rove’s playbook — evoked the 1929 stock market crash, Pearl Harbor, the Cuban missile crisis, the cold war and the 9/11 attacks, complete with video of Osama bin Laden. ‘If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen,’ the narrator intoned.” She also claimed she would be prepared to “obliterate” Iran if it attacked Israel.

Mrs. Clinton lost and Mr. Obama made her secretary of state — a mixed act of graciousness and smart politics. And Mrs. Clinton did well in that job until she decided to retire in 2013 and begin her run for the presidency in 2016.

She remained quiet for a while, but now she’s back in the public eye, and it’s clear she hasn’t developed an internal braking mechanism. She snapped at Terry Gross on Fresh Air for daring to ask about her evolving views on same-sex marriages, instead of simply answering the question. A few days ago, she cast doubt on Mr. Obama’s toughness in foreign affairs and said his “failure” in Syria had caused the current trouble in Iraq.

Maureen Dowd did a masterful job this morning of summing up the controversy.

I’ll just add a couple of thoughts. First, Mrs. Clinton did debate Mr. Obama on Syria. But in the end, she was part of the decision he made and she can’t wiggle out of that. (Just as she can’t wiggle out of her vote for the invasion of Iraq when she was in the Senate.) And the timing of her criticism was very strange, just before Mr. Obama started dropping bombs in Iraq. Her office said the interview had been long scheduled, but I find it hard to believe that Mrs. Clinton was not briefed on what was coming in Iraq, as a former secretary of state.

Inevitably, after a barrage of negative press, she retreated. A spokesman issued a statement explaining that she called the president on Tuesday to “make sure he knows that nothing she said was an attempt to attack him.” That’s not quite an apology, is it?

When she runs in 2016, she will want to separate herself from Mr. Obama. That’s normal. Doing it now, more than two years ahead of time, is inadvisable.